UPDATED: Fox on Newsmakers: Gay Marriage vote in 2013

Advocates always thought they could win in the House. And while victory was far from assured in the Senate, where Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed has been opposed, partisans argued that House passage was a necessary pre-condition to building the case in the Senate - to forcing that chamber to engage the issue in a real way.

Now, it appears, advocates may get their chance in the Senate. And with rising public support for gay marriage, it will be hard for the leadership in the upper chamber to resist.

UPDATE: And Marriage Equality Rhode Island, as if on cue, releases this statement:

Marriage Equality Rhode Island Campaign Director Ray Sullivan
released the following statement today regarding House Speaker Gordon
Fox's commitment to call a vote on the marriage equality legislation
early in the next General Assembly session:

"We appreciate Speaker Fox's commitment to finally
calling a vote on marriage equality and look forward to working with him
to pass this important civil rights legislation early in the next
session. Under Speaker Fox and Gov. Chafee's leadership, all eyes will
turn to the Senate, where there is a wide coalition working to ensure
that a pro-equality majority is elected.

"Every day, we strive to make 2013 the year in which
all loving, committed couples are finally recognized, respected and
treated equally under the law."